NEW YORK _ The Islanders' two wins this week could not have been more different.
After hanging on by thread to win on Tuesday at Buffalo, they delivered a dominant performance on Friday night, defeating the Sabres, 5-1, at the Barclays Center. Anthony Beauvillier, Ryan Strome, John Tavares, Andrew Ladd and Calvin de Haan scored for the hosts.
Beauvillier opened the scoring in the first period when he tipped in Travis Hamonic's shot at 12:05.
Strome doubled the lead at 14:36 of the second, poking in his own rebound after Sabres goaltender Anders Nilsson had made the initial save.
Later in the period, Tavares scored on the power play with 38 seconds left, getting the puck past a crowd in front of the net to beat Nilsson.
While third periods have been unkind to the Islanders lately, this was not the case Friday, as Ladd blasted a shot past Nilsson from just inside the face-off circle to make it 4-0 at 5:35 of the third. The hosts punctuated the win with a goal from Calvin de Haan, who scored after Alan Quine split two defenders to tee him up.
Zemgus Girgensons scored with just over a minute left for Buffalo to spoil the shutout for Thomas Greiss, who made 28 saves.
